April 30, 2010

In Appreciation of Mike Cooley

I’ve started writing what I hope will become my next novel. I can’t say much about it, other than it’s snarling and short, a fast-paced genre-tweaker with bad kids doing bad things. Trashy in only the best ways. Or so I hope.

I’ve thought about the style in relation to songwriting more than anything. A get in and get out sort of approach. Songwriters who are also storytellers have always appealed to me. People love to throw around Bob Dylan’s name in this department and I can’t blame them. I went through my Dylan phase, shortly after the mandatory Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd ones, and I can still say confidently that Dylan’s oft-overlooked  Ballad in Plain D has few lyrical peers. But I’ve been thinking more contemporary than stuff like that.

For my money, the best storytelling songwriter today is Mike Cooley from Drive-By Truckers. You may not listen to Drive-By Truckers, but you really should. Start with The Dirty South and work forward and backward from there. You’ll find the dominant voice in the band is Patterson Hood, and the man can write morality and mortality with the best of them. Jason Isbell appears on three albums and contributes a handful of gems, including three certifiable masterpieces. But it’s Mike Cooley who consistently and deceptively astonishes. He takes hook-heavy chug-a-lugging rock songs and finger-picked ballads and fills them with so many clever turns of phrases that you’d be tempted to think he’s just a whiskey-drenched jester, aiming for whoops and backstage fondles. What he’s really doing is writing efficient and effective tales, which taken together form a tragicomic southern epic of tough guys and sad sacks looking for a way out or a way back in life. The songs Zip City and Space City could work as the opening and closing chapters to a heartbreaking biographical novel. Carl Perkins’ Cadillac is a flawless distillation of the Sun Studio days in Memphis, while the rise and fall of grunge detailed in Self Destructive Zones serves as a sequel, featuring verses like:

The hippies rode a wave putting smiles on faces,
that the devil wouldn’t even put a shoe
Caught between a generation dying from its habits,
and another thinking rock and roll was new
Till the pawn shops were packed like a backstage party,
hanging full of pointy ugly cheap guitars
And the young’uns all turned to karaoke,
hanging all their wishes upon disregarded stars

Yes, Cooley gets in and gets out and gets it done. And since I have a crush on y’all, I’ve put together a little mixtape for you, an Itunes playlist of the Best of Mike Cooley.

I skipped songs from the new album The Big To Do, cause I haven’t had a chance to give it much of a listen. I’ve also left off live versions and his songs from Pizza Deliverance and The Fine Print, just to ruffle some feathers. Still, I think this is a good representation of Cooley at the top of his game and I hope it encourages you to buy some of the complete DBT albums (maybe you’ll prefer Patterson Hood – no skin off my back). For me, I’ll use the mix as inspiration and instruction while I write a children’s book. I’m sure that’s what Cooley intended.

P.S. Cooley and the gang are some of finest ambassadors from the state of Alabama. Worlds better than this knucklehead, in any case.

4 Comments | Posted by Aaron under Music | Bookmark or Share